Disappearing iPad note markups

I imagine there are very many small bugs here and there and they are inundated with requests for fixes. I would assume there is a threshold, as in after a certain number of complaints they will actually address it.

So frustrating.. same problem. Only reason my architect husband bought the iPad Pro. He sketches changes to the pdf of a cad drawing and they keep disappearing then emails to the CAD operator. Some, but not all of the changes keep disappearing. Only started happening in the last month or so.

Hi everyone--I posted here a few days ago. I downloaded Microsoft's OneNote app and it works really, really well. I'm not sure if this is a paid service because I have it through my school, but I would definitely recommend that you use this until Apple gets it together. It syncs with your wifi, so it's continuously saving your document. <3

I’m having the same problem! I have a university assignment due in 4 days and noticed that chunks of my preparation notes are gone! I spent my minimum wage, part time, money on this iPad to do my university work and this KEY feature isn’t working. Please fix or warn people because this is so incredibly frustrating.

I am a professora at university and have been using the iPad to grade the scanned exams, thus avoiding covid. It started to get very, very frustrating when all the annotations vanished.

I am using an iPad Pro 2018, updated to the latest iOS, I open the pdf in files, so with preview, and annotate with the Apple Pencil.

I started closing and openning the pdf more often, but the problem still crept in destroying my work. I then noticed in a large file with already some annotations that when closing the file with the Apple Pencil a pop up saying “saving” popped at the same place and the Apple Pencil would click again and cancel the save! I think this explains it!

My workaround had been to, with the pdf open, turn on and off the annotations, since it also saves the image and apparently does not re-trigger a cancel. An to close the pdf now I always use my finger and to the Apple Pencil.

This reduced drastically the issue, but I must say it still happened the other day, but it might be some distraction on my side.

I hope this can help you all, but it is a real shame on Apple for not addressing this head on!

All the best!

Wolf_Apple, I take that's in pages? I am having the same problem in notes, only there is no way to turn off smart annotation there, at least that I can see.... but I'm also using an iPad Air 3. I agree.... shame on Apple for not addressing this and fixing it.

I did try using pages, but sadly the eraser doesn't work properly there.... either erases the whole thing or not at all. ARGH!

To be clear:

what I discovered: after using the Apple Pencil to annotate/markup, when closing the file it started to save but the save was canceled, I think due to a repeat click by the pencil, and the file is closed without saving the annotations.

my solution: with the pdf open, after each small annotation/markup click on and off on the icon that shows the pencil options and colours, forcing iPad to save the update. I now also close the file with my finger and not the Apple Pencil.

In morte details, I am using preview and not notes nor pages, i.e., when I click on a pdf file in Files preview opens the file. On the top right side there is an icon I can use to have type pencil annotation float menu with tip type, color, etc. When I hit click this annotate and click again it says “saving image” (perhaps only visible with large files). Doing this after each iteration, as if going for ink with an ancient ink tip pen, has proved a safe way to lock my annotations. I only close the pdf file after “cycling” the annotation icon, since I discovered that my repetitive losses were due to inadvertently canceling the save that is done when you close the file due to a reaper at click by the Apple Pencil or my finger.

I hope this works for you, and you can share as helpful for others.

Middle school teacher here. I use a PDF of my textbook questions to go over with the kids and then upload for them to access as a key. I also include notes from class that I annotate as we go along. My writing has been disappearing, even as I upload the PDF to my drive immediately after I finish writing on it! I love this application for my classes. With kids in and out for Covid, I can keep my online information in synch with what we are doing in class and the kids can work from home much more easily. But for the last couple of weeks it has not been reliable. Thanks to those who went before me to get the attention of Apple service!

I think many of you complaining here, in this posting, need to switch to a more reliable, paid, third party app.

Forget the free Apple iOS/iPadOS Notes app!

I am a 12 year iPad users and that default, free Apple iOS/iPadOS Notes apps has NEVER been reliable for me to use as primary notes/pdf/document edotong app, ever!

You cannot paginate in the basic, free, default Apple iOS Notes app.

Notes created in the basic, barebones Notes app are one long, continuous note.

It has always been this way.

The default iOS Notes app is free and is of very limited features/functionalities.

If you really want to get the most out of that Apple Pencil and need extra note-taking features, I recommend looking at other paid, third party note taking apps.

Apple's free, default, iOS Notes app a a basic notes apps that Apple includes, more or less, as a example “showcase” app of what could be done when designing/coding a more fully featured note-taking app.

Apple's free Notes app is NOT a full featured notes app and has many useful features not available to it.

Apple has always treated their iOS Notes app in a way where the app is like only approx. 80% “there”.

To make the free iOS Notes app a relatively basic, simple notes app that anyone can, more or less, learn fairly easily, Apple's Notes has eschewed many useful features found in other more powerful and robust/feature-rich, third party note taking apps.

Also, to also emphasize how basic the free iOS Notes app is, Apple ONLY upgrades/updates this app once a year with a new iOS/iPadOS version introduction every September/October.

Forget the free Apple Notes apps. I has been a constant source of frustrations and headaches to many users over its long history.

Apple just can't seem to get their free Notes app to work with any long-term trust/reliability

If you need more features from a notes/note taking app, I recommend you look to the Apple iOS App Store for more fully featured, third party apps that get many regular updates throughout the years!

Here is an incomplete list of much better notes/note taking apps you may wish/want to look at that are more robust and feature-rich, in no particular order.

INKredible

Liquid Text

Margin Note 3

Microsoft One note

Nebo

Notability

Notepad+/Notrpad+ Pro

NoteShelf 2

Notes Plus

Notes Writer/(Pro)

Notebook

Good Notes 5

Zoom Notes

Quick Notes X Pro

PDF Pro

Lots more paid choices than this. Look for PDF editors, as well.

The basic Apple Notes app has NEVER been up to the challenge of a powerful, note-taking app and/or a PDF/document editor.

Never!

You all need to stop wasting your time with the free Apple Notes app!

It is simply NOT worth all of its frustrations and aggravations.

Best of Luck to ALL of You!

I think, we are NOT talking about the Notes App specifically, but about a broader Problem when adding hand-written comments referred to as „notes“ to a range of documents. I suspect, this is an iPad problem, somewhere deep inside. I experienced it - unconsciously for a while - when working on theses of my students in PDF format, I presume with Preview App. Once I re-opened a file which showed my remarks in the thumbnails, but not in the page presentation itself. Of course they where gone after the next „saving“…

Using Notability from now on - GoodReader was good as well, but its gone…

This literally just happened to me.

Studying for the last 6 hours, reading and marking up a PDF in the Files application.

The screen flashed and all my markups were gone.

Holy. Crap.

My PDF is in iCloud Drive, but apparently there's no revision there, so I can't even see if there's an incremental save somewhere.

I'm completely blown away by this, and as was already said, this makes my iPad and it's usefulness drop significantly to the point where I'll go back to printing and actually writing on paper.

It’s an absolute shame we’re in February 2022 and Apple still doesn’t address the actual problem MANY people are dealing with. We are NOT mentioning the disappearance of a Note on the Notes app. We are talking about lost handwritten notes we have taken on the preview opening of a File on iPad. I have lost countless hours of note-taking on PDFs, that have SIMPLY VANISHED after I’m finished. No button clicked by mistake, no ctrl+Z, no finger swipe, absolutely no action taken at all with the aim to erase not even a single comma. I’ve seen people reporting this problem in forums since years ago and no adequate response is ever given. I have just lost all my handwritten notes taken during class on my iPad Pro 2021, bought specifically for this purpose... but the same thing has happened to me some years ago on my MacBook, precisely on Preview.

Obviously, Apple does not care to prioritize this issue as this has been happening for years. I never received a promised return call I made over a month ago now.

I know it seems like people continue to reply, but I assume the individuals leaving frustrated comments are experiencing this for the first time.

I find Notability as a suitable app—only $8.99/year and we’ll worth it considering it accomplishes my note-taking needs with more features and does what I need Adobe for without having to pay Adobe prices.

This thread is not about using "Apple Notes", if you read it.

It's about making notes on PDF's. When I do it, I use the "Files" application. I don't know if my iPad is using a different app to actually allow me to make notes or not. But I am not opening the "Notes" application and using that.

YES. I've read through and it looks like there still isn't an official response or fix.

I am near a mental breakdown at the amount of notes I've lost. I will spend hours reading and annotating readings to prepare for class (as the teacher--so these notes are crucial) and they will disappear for no reason and I'm unable to retrieve them. Please someone tell me how to recover them.

There is no way to Save within the Files folder. All you can do is hit Done. Sometimes, when I hit it, everything is saved nicely. Other times, 10 pages of preparation are erased. Just heartbreaking.